Snipit
by tami3
Summary: Bookmen aren't the only ones who can make observations. Lavi-centric, the various little things others take away from him. Like a line of ink.


Snip-it

"We're all friends here." Lavi said to him with grin. Lenalee smiled and nodded fervently beside him. He rested his elbow on her shoulder amiably and gave her a quick look-over out of the corner of his eye. God, she was so _cute._

_-_

Kanda was the one to see him first because they had sent him outside to observe, just in case. The golems had informed them that there were two suspicious figures approaching, wrapped up in ponchos that looked like heavy burlap and thick scarves obscuring their faces.

Kanda saw the taller one pull down the cloth to take a quick breath. From a distance, the Japanese teenager could only make out two things: the blaring red of the stranger's hair, and the look of absolute truthand conceit.

He thought, _maybe I won't dislike this one as much as the others_.

-

When he first arrived, Komui was worried he was going to get too friendly with Kanda.

Just children, weren't they? Liked associating with those of their own age, highly impressionable and the like? Goodness, what a blessing that there were no girls around to boss Lenalee into being a gossipy little schoolyard wench. The new boy, now there was going to be a problem.

Kanda was antisocial. He didn't like people. That didn't mean to say Komui didn't anticipate him liking making a victim out of someone. (It was already well established he liked victims.)

Two boys on the cusp of manhood, and in a military organization, no less! Of course there would be some macho standoffs, and under the pretense of friendship, too. For a few years, at least.

Stupid teenage boy duos. Whoever was stronger was the bully, whoever was weaker would be the bullied. That was the way of the world. And Lavi didn't look very strong.

Komui was worried.

-

The difference with him and all the other children they acquired (which they abducted as politely as possible from their families) was that the he had come with something of a parent. A shrunken old man who wore makeup around his eyes that made him look like a mystic, or an exotic animal, at least, had one day come through the underground waterway, claiming official business with the order with some lofty and erudite title like "Bookman" to back it up. He had a tagalong kid with him.

Bookman spoke all of the major languages that circulated around the Order without mistake, and dozens more obscure ones whom no one could confirm his grasp of because they had never heard of them before. The first, the most emphasized thing he said, was "I've come with my apprentice."

The boy was fifteen and stared hard like a marble bust of Medusa. So intensely interested, he tried to capture you in stone. It was a little scary.

When Komui greeted them in his office and started the files for the new members, he gave the young, vivid thing a skeptical glance.

Bookman caught the look of inquiry.

"Troublesome age." Bookman grunted. He smacked the youth in the back of his hand with a surprisingly heavy-handed blow. "Introduce yourself," he ordered.

Komui had never seem more charmless dimples.

"Heartless!" he laughed. Bookman struck the back of his kneecaps. The child caught himself in the middle of a sharp, high cry. It became a fit of giggles.

"Lavi." he said finally, the "vi" veering into a higher register. He pulled a grinning grimace to his mentor's shriveled, shaking fist.

Well, well. Komui thought, leaning back in his chair. His voice hasn't even finished changing yet.

-

He seemed so festive and pretty; he was not yet outfitted with a somber uniform (although no one quite knew exactly what he or his master were yet; they debated, finders? Exorcists? Most likely additions to the science department, since they conversed about some fairly technical things sometimes). His brilliant red hair, bright green eyes, and normal clothes made him stand out among the milling white throngs of lab coats and finder's cloaks (interrupted by the occasional dot of Exorcist black). Irish, some of the finders wondered? But he drawled playfully like an Australian, or an American cowboy. There was _some _European in him--he was too high chroma to be otherwise.

Komui cooperated with Bookman and his charge with all they asked, because they only had simple requests about using the library archives, and the Order was traditionally reverent of the Bookman clan.

But the longer they stayed the more uneasy he felt about them.

-

One didn't laugh at all, had cheekbones sharp enough to grate dairy product on, and rudely plowed through piles of noodles when all others were trying to respectfully observe a moment of silence for the dead. The other laughed at things that weren't funny, skirt-chased indiscriminately, and had too many ignoble applications for markers.

By default, if there are two assholes in an organization, each asshole becomes less of an asshole.

All the same, Komui would have preferred having none.

He was severely exasperated.

-

"Yu, come help me with--"

Everyone in the immediate vicinity heard a vehement string of Japanese profanities. They went on with their lives, being quite accustomed to it.

"Aw, come on, Yu…"

"You already know about honorifics, don't you? Then stop fucking around on purpose!"

"What? Yu just sounds better. The 'K' is cacophonous."

"…Address me properly, or…"

There was the slight rasping of blade edge against its scabbard.

"…Did you know 'yu' is 'fish' in Mandarin?"

More cursing and a tiny nick to the nose later (Lenalee had nonchalantly handed him a band-aid) Lavi resisted stomping out of the room, keeping his pace steady.

_Why would anyone reject their name if they had one?_, he thought darkly. He quickly pushed the tired old bitterness of Bookman gripes aside, like always.

He wasn't intimidated by the Japanese exorcist because humans had ceased to be intimidating to him. That was one of the biggest perks of Bookman's big decision to insinuate their way into the war until they had a first-person view. Humans were not the only party involved, and they weren't the only ones who could be interesting.

Lavi blew away the shavings of bangs on his mouth. Where were those goddamned akuma? Everyone expected him to hang out with the boy of his own age, but his one-trick I'm-going-to-kill-you routine was getting old fast.

"Yu" did not put him off at all. He'd be fine. Kanda's reactions to his current persona (unfailingly chipper) could turn out to be something to keep him occupied until the war started for real.

Bring it on, fish boy.

-

Lenalee spun on her heel to avoid getting knocked over by Kanda, who was very stormily storming out a room into the storm outside. His face was awfully red, and, eep, those had better not be tears. The thought of having to chase after him and emotionally coach him through his tears left a skeevy feeling on her skin.

She took a look inside the room he had left just to make sure. Lavi at the table, wearing a triumphant expression, one arm naked to the bicep.

"Swordsmanship is about precision." He flexed coquettishly when Lenalee remained mystified. "Arm wrestling is not."

-

"Uncle."

Allen withdrew his arm (regularly sized, but scaly as if it were coated in cornflakes). He didn't know what to be more upset about, Lavi's VERY sulky look or Kanda's VERY happy one.

Lenalee was helping Lavi pierce his ear ("Don't flinch or it'll tear a long hole, she warned him). She had done her own and now modest studs dotted her lobes. Komui had tantrumed about his little girl playing at being a woman, then promptly bought her a set of black rings, which he thought would be prettier. She always wore her hair up, so something more noticeable would call attention to how sophisticated she was--wearing earrings like a grown-up professional, wanting to fit her role of assistant head officer!

She'd thanked him politely and had asked Lavi if he wanted them. She thought they would catch her ponytails.

"There!" Lenalee took out the needle and backed away, admiring her handiwork. She'd managed to center it perfectly.

Lavi had already come with one pierced ear and wanted another so her could wear Lenalee's present as a pair.

"Yu would look nice with pierced ears, wouldn't he?" Lavi impishly proposed.

"Kanda? Mm…no, I don't think so." Lenalee leaned in and patted at the beads of blood with a handkerchief.

"Eh? Why not?"

"Well, he looks enough like a girl already, doesn't he?" Lenalee impatiently squeezed--the tiny wound was leaking more than she anticipated, and she wanted to put the earring in already.

Lavi had the goofiest look on his face as he played with the loops in their velvet box. "So why are they ok on me?"

"You don't look like a girl at all, Lavi. Earrings are nice on you without being too feminine. Someone like Kanda…it only takes a little to tip the iceberg, you know. Oh, but…that can be okay. He looks good that way, somehow…" Lenalee absently mumbled as she poked around Lavi's cartilage.

Lavi tried to hold in his laughter at Kanda's expression over Lenalee's shoulder.

"So, Kanda." she said out loud. "Do you want me to do yours anyways?"

-

"Go work out your sexual frustration on Allen" earned him a haircut.

"Lavi, that style doesn't suit you at all." Lenalee informed him, tipping a chocolate get-well cake onto his bed stand. "Your last bandanna was nicer."

"Oh, ha ha." he said grumpily. He shifted his bandaged skull on his pillow. "I could have said it to you, you know."

Lenalee put her hands on her hips. "Lavi, you just don't have any concept of going too far, do you?" She shoved her frosted cake onto his lap. "Thankfully, none of us do."

_A/N:I was looking through my notes for "Like Story" and thought, why not?_


End file.
